


Masquerades

by Phoenixofslytherin



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Dancing, F/M, Long held feelings, Romance, Solving Mysteries, planning, working together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2020-10-03
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:07:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26790388
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Phoenixofslytherin/pseuds/Phoenixofslytherin
Summary: The word Masquerade has two different meanings. On one hot summer's night Hermione discovers that she quite likes the idea of exploring both. Particularly as it means enlisting the help of the man she has long hidden her true feelings from........
Relationships: Sirius Black/Hermione Granger
Comments: 5
Kudos: 38
Collections: Roll-a-Prompt Writing Comp 2020





	Masquerades

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Hermione's Haven Roll a prompt writing challenge 2020.
> 
> Many thanks to my alpha/beta. Champagneandliterature, your help and love of Sirius was much appreciated 
> 
> Entry #6  
> Character: Sirius Black  
> Trope: Co-Workers  
> Overarching Theme: Masquerade

“Come on Kitten you owe me a dance at least. Think of what you’re asking me to do, it’s most unreasonable.” Sirius’s grey eyes were alight with mischief as he gazed playfully out from underneath his masquerade mask. Hermione giggled under his scrutiny, something she seemed to be doing rather a lot around him lately. “It’s an enormous ask from you,” he repeated, “and all I’m asking in return is one little -”

“Alright alright!” Hermione laughed properly as she took the hand he offered. He pulled her to her feet and led her through the crowded bar and onto the dance floor. “I don’t understand why you’re so keen to dance with  _ me _ anyway,” she protested, “when there’s a whole room full of eligible ladies, and probably a fair few men who are desperate to fall into your arms. I can feel their death stares boring into me right now in fact.” She turned her head to the side and sure enough, several witches were sending unimpressed glances her way.

“Why on Earth does that bother you?” Sirius asked as they reached the open dance floor and he pulled her smoothly into his arms. His eyes sobered, turning suddenly intense as he looked down at her, “Shall we give them something to watch?”

“Behave yourself for once!” Hermione giggled again as he spun her around and then pulled her back snugly against him. “Do you really think I’m asking a lot of you?” She asked, looking up and trying to read his expression underneath the mask, “And more to the point, despite the alleged enormity of the ask,  _ will  _ you help me?” She tried to ignore the way his hard, toned body felt as he pressed against her and grinned again. 

“It's a  _ huge _ ask, Kitten. You’re going to have to think of an extremely good way to reward me.” Hermione pulled in a shaky breath against his chest, hoping he hadn’t noticed the way her body was reacting to him. 

“You haven’t agreed to do it yet, so it’s a bit early to be asking for rewards.” She tried to keep the conversation light as Sirius spun her out again and James neatly pulled her in from the other side, trading her with Lily who was swept up into Sirius’s waiting arms. 

”Have you convinced him to help yet?” James asked.

“He’s driving a hard bargain, Hermione smiled, “But I think he’s going to say yes.”

“Good. Do you know how many other people have asked him to help figure that thing out?” James asked, twirling her in his arms once more as she shook her head.

“Since he hasn’t been involved in any of the studies so far I figured I was the first?” Hermione said, genuinely surprised.

“Oh no!” James’s eyes glinted. “He gets owls about that damn veil almost once a week.”

Hermione stopped dancing and stared at James in shock. For a moment she cursed the masquerade masks, they made everyone’s faces so difficult to read. “So he’s turned all  the previous offers down?” James nodded, his eyes shining as he chuckled at her confusion, “So why has he said yes, or is about to say yes to my request?”

James took a deep breath and jiggled her arm to get her moving again. He gave her a rather telling look and she gasped in surprise, “He likes you. Always has. You’re a smart girl Hermione, surely you can work out what I mean by that?”

Hermione frowned, catching the familiar grin on James’s partly obscured face. “You don’t mean? you can’t possibly, no! Surely not?!”

“Have it your way then.” James spun her out again with another grin and she swapped partners with Lily once more. “He’s said no to everyone who’s asked him before you though, that’s all I’m saying.” James laughed at Hermione’s shocked face as Lily looked at her husband curiously.

As Sirius pulled her close to him again Hermione tried to gather her thoughts. Was James really suggesting that Sirius was interested in her? She took a deep breath against him, inhaling his unique scent of leather, spice, and smoke, and suddenly felt overwhelmed by his proximity. If he really was interested in her, well, the feeling was mutual. “Have you thought of a way to repay me then?” Sirius dropped his head and spoke so closely that his breath tickled her ear.

“Sorry what?” She stumbled as he moved her in time to the music. 

“Whatever did James say that’s put you so much on edge?” His voice was a low purr and it did nothing to subdue the flicker of interest that James had ignited. That particular flicker had been smoldering and burning deep inside her for a long time and she had always been careful to keep it under control. Now though it was threatening to rise up and consume her. “I wondered if you’d thought of a way to make this huge ask of your’s up to me, and you look like you’ve seen a ghost. What’s going on in that pretty little head of yours?”

Hermione took a deep breath and flicked her curls out of her eyes, forcing herself to get a grip. This was Sirius Black for Merlin’s sake, Harry’s Godfather, James’ and Remus’ best friend, notorious Hogwarts marauder, and all-round general enigma. He was the last person on Earth who would be interested in her. Wasn’t he? He could have and did have, his pick of witches. Or wizards depending on which rumors you believed. Harry liked to joke that Grimmauld Place had a revolving door when Sirius was in the mood for company. And then, on top of all that were the rather persistent rumors of some sort of intimacy between him and Remus, despite Remus’s happy marriage to Tonks...Sirius never confirmed or denied this, and even Tonks stayed uncharacteristically quiet on that whole subject. 

Hermione honestly didn’t know what to make of what James had just said. “Alright, what did Prongs say? Come on Kitten, something’s spooked you, talk to me.”

Hermione swallowed weakly as he took her hand again and led her away from the dance floor. He snagged a glass of Elf made Prosecco and a tumbler of Firewhisky from a House Elf’s tray on their way outside and handed her the glass. She sipped from it delicately, thanking him and wondering how to word what she needed to say. “James mentioned that  I’m not the first person to ask you for help in figuring out the veil.” She said as he led her outside and into the balmy summer evening.

“You're not.”

“But you’ve not agreed to help anyone else.”

“Nope.”

  
“But you are going to help me?”

“Yep,” he grinned, pulling his mask off to reveal his extremely handsome face. 

“Why Sirius? Why will you help me and not the others?” Hermione resolutely kept her mask on. Her cheeks had heated considerably with James's words, and she wasn’t ready for Sirius to see the effect he was having on her just yet.

Sirius threw his head back and laughed. “You don’t ease in gently with your questions do you Kitten? Okay okay,” he sat down at an empty table, threw back his glass of Firewhisky, and stared at her intently. Hermione pulled her own chair closer and sat beside him. “Since the veil malfunctioned and spat me out two years ago I’ve had all sorts of people fawning over me and being nice to me because they want something. They want me to tell them the veil’s secrets. They seem to think that I can offer them the meaning of life, or explain death or something equally outrageous. I can’t do either of those things. All I know is what happened to me, and even that I can't explain.” 

He blinked, uncharacteristically serious for once, and sighed. “I’m also somewhat notorious, and people find that intriguing. Since you all cleared my name and people know I’m not a mass murderer, they all want a piece of me. Harry understands my objection to that the best, although I’d guess that you probably have some idea as well. Legends have built up around us Hermione, people follow us, hanging on everything we say and do.” He pulled a pack of cigarettes from his pocket, put one in his mouth, and lit it with a click of his fingers.  “Then there’s the fact that everyone who has wanted my help so far has been from the Ministry. The same Ministry who threw me into Azkaban and left me to rot for 12 years without so much as checking to see if I was guilty of the crime I was imprisoned for. Imprisoned without a trial for, no less, because the  _ Ministry d _ ecreed it so.”  Hermione watched him in rapt silence. “The Ministry of Magic took 12 years of my life from me in a very unjust way, and has never once apologized for that, or attempted to help me once my name was cleared. I have no intention of  _ ever  _ setting foot inside of, or of helping the Ministry of Magic in any way.”

Hermione nodded, suddenly feeling crestfallen. If that was how he felt, he was never going to help her in the way that she wanted. “I work for the Ministry though.” She said in a small voice. “If you help me you’ll be helping the Ministry by default.”

“Ah. I thought we might hit that little snag.” He stared at her, taking a long drag on his cigarette and watching her as if sizing her up. “I have an alternative proposition for you.”

“Go ahead,” she said dubiously, wondering what he had in mind. 

“I wasn’t strictly honest a moment ago. I do know a lot more about the veil than I’ve let on. There are things I can tell you about it that probably nobody else in the world knows or understands. I can tell you about death in a way that no one else can. And I’ll tell  _ you _ , Hermione, not the Ministry.”

She leaned towards him transfixed, “How will that work?”

“No one must know I’m helping you. I’ll tell you what I know. You’ll go into work as an Unspeakable as usual and do the tests and the research. You’ll toe the Ministry line, file your reports and do your job as you are now. Officially you will approach me to help you, and I will refuse, as I have refused to help everyone else. It’s common knowledge that I’m difficult after all.” He grinned. “Meanwhile you bring your findings home to me and we combine our knowledge and figure it out together. Then, when we’ve solved the mystery you publish our findings and sit back to watch the fireworks at the Ministry. You get the recognition you deserve for being brilliant and I get the satisfaction of knowing that I got one over the people that stole 12 years of my life.”

Hermione’s eyes had grown wider with every second he had been talking. She stared at him now and he laughed. “Catching flies there, Kitten?”

Consciously she closed her mouth and blinked, “So you want to completely go against the Ministry, but you also want to help solve the mystery of the veil?”

“Yes,” he agreed. “That about sums it up. I was never particularly keen on doing things the conventional way.”

“No.” Hermione agreed weakly, “I know.”

“So what do you say, Kitten?” he gave her a winning smile, “We’re at a masquerade ball already, it seems like a fitting place to discuss the other definition of the word masquerade. Do you think you can pull it off? More to the point, do you want to pull it off? Do you think you and I can work together?”

Hermione licked her lips and gave him a slow, satisfied smile. She already knew what her answer would be. “Sirius, I know Harry vanquished Voldemort but I masterminded a lot of our plans that year, including breaking into the Ministry to steal back the locket from Umbridge, and robbing your cousin’s vault at Gringotts for Hufflepuff’s cup. Believe me, I can pull this off. As for working together, well, you’re not usually all that difficult in my opinion. Are you really agreeing to tell me  _ all  _ of your secrets?”

  
“I already knew you were the brains behind the anti-Voldemort operation.” Sirius chuckled, “Harry and Ron openly admit that anyway. And yes, Hermione, I will tell you  _ all _ of  my secrets.” His voice was low and honeyed as he spoke, “Although I’ll warn you, some of them might give you a bit of an education.”

Hermione took a sip of prosecco to break the tension. Suddenly she didn’t know where to look. “I meant the secrets you know about the veil!” She said, her cheeks flushing under her mask again as she looked down and smiled. He smiled back, stubbing his cigarette out and vanishing the end with a wave of his hand,

“Yes, Hermione,” her name rolled across his tongue slowly, and the way he said it made her insides react alarmingly, “I will tell you  _ everything _ I know. I’ll even tell you some things about the veil too. If you ask nicely,” he added with a wink.

Hermione laughed and closed her eyes against the images his words were conjuring in her mind again, “then Mr. Black, I believe we have a deal.”

“Indeed we do.” He held out his hand and they shook with a grin. Suddenly though, his eyes turned dark and he ran the tip of his pink tongue over his lips. He kept hold of her hand, using it to pull her closer to him. “Do you want to hear a secret now?” he asked, and she bit her bottom lip as she nodded, transfixed. “You look stunning tonight.”

This time she couldn’t hide the effect his words had on her. He looked down, rubbing his thumb gently over her knuckles. “Uh, thank you,” she said weakly, wishing she could think of something more intelligent to say. 

“And, I believe you own me the rest of our somewhat interrupted dance. Shall we?” Hermione nodded as they stood up and Sirius led her back inside, keeping hold of her hand on the way.

Inside the hall the music was loud, the wine intoxicating, and the company second to none. Hermione danced with Sirius, James, Harry, Ron, Ginny and Luna, and then Remus who passed her back to Sirius with a rather knowing look. “He’s not taken his eye off you all night,” Remus whispered before letting her go with a wink. “Have fun.”

“Hermione,” Sirius said, gathering her into his arms again and rolling her name around his tongue again.

“Why are you saying my name like that?” The wine was making her bold and she asked the question rather coyly, looking up at him through her dark lashes.

Sirius’s answering smile was slow and sinful. “Because I enjoyed the effect it had on you outside and I’m wondering if that was a one-off, or if I can pull the same reaction out of you again.”

Hermione nodded weakly. She pressed into him and he made a small noise in the back of his throat. There was no way she could miss his arousal, it was pressing against her stomach as clear as day so she rubbed herself discreetly against it and smiled as he groaned. 

“Kitten,” he pulled back to look at her, “that’s something a naughty girl would do. 

“Yes. Yes, I suppose it is.” she stared right into his eyes as she spoke, watching his pupils dilate with lust as he stared hungrily back. His lips crashed down on hers making her squeak in surprise as she kissed him back, hot, hungry, and desperate for more. 

Sirius brought his hands up from her back to her hair and gently threaded his fingers through it as he deepened the kiss. When they finally broke apart they were both breathing hard. “Well Hermione,” he smirked, “This is going to make the whole working together thing a lot more interesting. Don’t you think?”

“Yes,” she said weakly, resting her head on his shoulder as he pulled her in close again. The last thing she saw before she closed her eyes and lost herself to the heady thrum of the music and the feel of Sirius’s arms wrapped tightly around her was the smile and the wink James Potter gave her from under his masquerade mask on the other side of the dance floor. 


End file.
